Ghent · Nightlife

Order the 1.2-litre Max and they hold one shoe hostage in a basket overhead. Around 250 beers on the list.

A canal-side beer cafe by the Vleeshuis bridge with its own house brews and a terrace right over the Leie.

Vlasmarkt institution with free live gigs and DJs most nights, running very late and usually free to enter.

The renovated Vooruit arts centre: concerts, club nights and a grand cafe inside a 1913 socialist palace.

A tiny canal-side jenever bar beside the Waterhuis, pouring more than 200 flavoured Belgian gins by the glass.